


Lotus Blooms

by Arin93



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen, Multi, Not Beta Read, POV First Person, Self-Insert, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-08
Updated: 2020-07-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:48:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25144930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arin93/pseuds/Arin93
Summary: Fuck is the right word when you realize you’re alive again.Existence is a pain you had hoped to forget ever happened to you.Now you’re here again.Maybe it’s time You happened to existence. Whatever that means.Oh, and look at that, ninjas are a thing now.
Relationships: Haruno Sakura & Original Male Character(s), Haruno Sakura & Yamanaka Ino
Kudos: 22





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: language and violence for now, not sure how explicit the violence will be but I will change the warnings if needed.  
> Tags: loads of characters tags to add, I will add as I go along I guess.  
> Ships: undecided

_You wonder when awareness happens. You wondered it before and you wonder it now as you look towards a bright sky like any other you looked at Before._

* * *

It’s, as always, a beautiful backdrop to whatever fuckery happens down here.

At this moment it being some form of my renewed awareness and the sense that _I’ve seen this before_ while focusing on the four heads carved into the side of a mountain.

Our adult tells us about the _Hokage_ Monument when he notices my interest.

I look away and get lost in all the colours around us.

The adults, Our parents, are kind and shower Us with attention and warmth in such a direct and candid way it makes bitter old me uncomfortable. Visibly uncomfortable. It makes me feel worse seeing how patient they’re in front of their constantly surly toddler.

Fortunately, there’s _Sakura_.

She’s a quiet child too, but at least she’s not grumpy old me. She’s just a baby.

Being her twin brother technically makes me a baby too, but it’s hard to feel like one when I vaguely remember being a somewhat functional adult.

I could at least move my body to my will then.

I loved that. Moving how I wanted to.

I guess that’s what pushes me to stand up again after falling fuck knows how many times. The Parents are being incredibly loud as they watch my attempts. How embarrassing.

We were brought to the park to socialize with other kids but they suck.

“Ren what happened?” is what our Mom says to us when I come to her all muddied up dragging Sakura by her hand while she tries her best to hide behind me.

“They were mean and dumb” is what I declare while sniffling and trying futilely not to cry. Not being able to control your own tear ducts, how embarrassing.

When Mom’s arms surround us, I don’t hesitate to hold onto her with my tiny fingers.

Sure, I understand “your facing” that kid for insulting Sakura wasn’t the fairest of somewhat Adult me, and while I honestly can’t tell how that devolved into a brawl with some older kids, I reckon that made all of it even.

Sometimes I wonder.

Was I a shinobi in my past life too?

Even if I _know_ there was a Before I’m not too sure what it entailed. Konoha feels familiar, apart from this current life I must have spent time in Konoha Before.

Whatever the case I can’t wait to become a Konoha Shinobi like our parents.

* * *

_You guess awareness comes in stages. It makes sense then, for it to also leave in stages. And then it happens again and again and again and again and again…_


	2. Us, You and I

_Together, You took Your first breath, before that Your heartbeats were already in sync… but even Earlier, were You still Together?_

_…Or was it just you._

* * *

As the time to start the Academy approaches a strange feeling invades me.

At first, I think it’s just anticipation. But as I watch our parents move us into different rooms it feels more like dread.

We’ve always done everything together, Sakura and I. I’ve _never_ felt the need to separate our existence because I thought it was just one and the same.

Our parents say it’s because we’re older kids now, who can go to the academy, and so we should get our separate spaces.

It’s not the first time they’ve pushed us to do things “ _separately”_ but in this they don’t seem to want to compromise.

And I did ask Dad, he folds easier.

“Dad, do we have to? If we room together we will still have an extra room too. And We like it fine how it is.”

Maybe I rushed my words a bit, but I thought it would be ok because our dad is soft and I rarely ask for anything.

I know when I see his _patronizing_ smile that he’s not going to change his mind “It’s good that you thought about how this would affect our household, but you don’t need to worry about the house, that’s what Papa and Mama are here for!” he says with his big foolish smile.

“But Ren, have you asked Sakura about how she feels about the rooms?”

I look at him like he’s an idiot, because _he is_. But he’s even more of a fool than I thought to ask that question, so I promptly turn around and walk away from him.

I go look for Sakura, and find her fixing the new room with Mom. I stop in the hallway before entering when I see the look in her face.

She looks so happy.

It’s such a stark difference from how I feel about this I almost ask her why she’s smiling. Surely it can’t be about the rooms, but it obviously is.

It is how I find myself in our old room, now just mine, thinking about Sakura and I.

I did think Sakura and I were the same, we did things differently but we were just different parts of the Same. She knew how to act at each time so when she couldn’t say or act how we really felt because of it, I did.

That’s how I thought we worked but maybe I was wrong.

I look at our room with just one bed now and my eyes begin to sting.

The room is blurry as my eyes shift from place to place for somewhere to rest where it doesn’t hurt.

But it’s impossible.

I never cared for the room décor; it’s always been nice even if it’s just a room but now it seems all the more glaring that it’s a _child’s_ room.

I begin pulling off what I can get at with my height. I put it in a pile in the middle.

All the games and books are still here. We both liked the memorization games and You were both good at it, but most of the rest of those games and toys _I_ played with because of _Sakura_.

Same with the books, except YOU’re both really past a lot of these books for children to learn how to read.

I see that the wardrobe is already half empty, but what does it matter really because _Sakura_ and _I_ mostly have the same outfits really.

I’ve been constantly sniffling and trying to swallow the sobs for a while now. I know even if Sakura didn’t notice when I was just outside the room, Mom did, and she will come check up on me eventually.

It must have been twenty minutes when Mom finally appears in the doorway.

Without turning to her you say “I don’t want that” referring to the pile in the middle.

I can sense her moving further into the room so I take a step away.

If she tries to touch me right now, I will bite her.

“…that’s fine, do you want anything else off the walls”

There’s still these childish vinyls towards the top of the wall plus the glow in the dark star stickers on the ceiling.

“...the stars can stay” I decide as I fiddle with a toy kunai I thought was ok to keep.

Soon after I hear her steps retreat.

At some point, after tossing and turning for what must have been forever, I must have fallen asleep.

I awake again in the middle of the night to the feeling of someone in the room.

“Sakura?” my voice is slurred with sleep.

“…I couldn’t sleep” comes the timid voice from the foot of the bed.

Seeing she’s probably not gonna say anything else and just stay there waiting I grumble for her to just get in the bed, which she promptly does.

“Thanks Ren”

“Hnn” I respond while my brain begins to turn again.

We’ve been laying in silence for a bit when some of my earlier thoughts prompt me to speak up.

“Sakura, are you awake?”

“Yes”

…

Does Sakura remember a Before? Is what I want to ask. If we’re not the same as I thought, then are we different in this too. It’s such a scary thought I almost don’t say anything.

“Ren?” But it’s Sakura. And I need to know for sure.

“What is the first thing you remember?” And for that matter, what is the first thing I remember?

Sakura thinks on it for a bit, which gives me a flicker of hope. But then she speaks.

“I think it was in the study, we were getting books from the shelves we could get to and then mom discovered us.”

That sounds like us, and seems familiar, but it’s very far from what I wanted to hear.

“You?”

“Dunno, I sort of remember that too”

If Sakura did remember, her response would have been different, she would definitely have understood it the moment I asked that question.

My eyes sting once again and the blurry shadows become blurrier.

I expected it, I suspected it. And yet, this hurts so much.

“Goodnight Ren” she says.

And I whisper back “Night Sakura”

* * *

_You remember, while the two of you were born together, everyone Awakens alone._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know the blurbs at the beginning and the end are gonna bite me in the ass at some point.


End file.
